It is now common to generate multiple volumes of image data during a magnetic resonance imaging procedure on a patient. Other medical imaging procedures on a patient also generate multiple volumes.
When analyzing the volumes to generate an image of the patient, it becomes necessary to align adjacent volumes. This is a difficult task to perform. It generally requires analyzing a pair of volumes and determining the optimal way to align the volumes based on the analysis.
It is possible to visually tell whether volumes are well aligned by examining the resulting photo. For example, if a visual inspection of the image shows that structures, such as bones or blood vessels align, then the alignment would be deemed good. On the other hand, if the visual examination shows that the structures do not align, then the alignment would be deemed bad.
The visual inspection, however, has its limitations. For example, it is time consuming. It also requires one or more persons to examine a plurality of different alignments to judge which are acceptable. The visual inspection is also subject to the inspector's objectivity. Furthermore, it is difficult for a inspector to determine an optimal alignment in a three dimensional setting, such as MR volumes.
Thus, new and improved method and systems to judge the quality of the alignment of volume pairs is needed.